CityLab | Sara Rankinhttps://www.citylab.com/authors/sara-rankin/2018-06-20T16:58:58-04:00Copyright 2020 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All Rights Reserved.tag:citylab.com,2018:209-563258<p>Increasingly, local laws punish Americans who are homeless.</p><p>By severely restricting or even barring the ability to engage in necessary, life-sustaining activities in public, like sitting, standing, sleeping, or asking for help, even when there’s no reasonable alternative, these laws are essentially persecuting homeless men, women, and children.</p><p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=qlW-Ku8AAAAJ&amp;hl=en&amp;oi=ao">law professors</a> who <a href="http://ssrn.com/author=1572922">study how laws can make homelessness better or worse</a>, we encourage cities, suburbs and towns to avoid punishing people who live in public and have nowhere else to go. One big reason: These “<a href="https://definitions.uslegal.com/v/vagrancy/">anti-vagrancy laws</a>” are counterproductive because they make it harder to escape homelessness.</p><h4>Many paths to not having a home</h4><p>Why do at least <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-there-are-so-many-unsheltered-homeless-people-on-the-west-coast-96767">half a million Americans experience homelessness</a> at any time?</p><p>Researchers find that most people who become homeless have nowhere to live after <a href="https://www.nlchp.org/documents/Homeless_Stats_Fact_Sheet">being evicted</a>, losing their jobs, or <a href="http://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/domestic.html">fleeing an abusive partner</a>.</p><p>Many emergency homeless shelters <a href="http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-los-angeles-shelter-shortage-20170929-htmlstory.html">are perpetually full</a>. Even those with beds to spare may enforce rules that exclude <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2776421">families, LGBTQ youth</a>, and <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2776427">people with pets</a>.</p><p>And when homeless people can stay in shelters, often they may only spend the night there. That means they have to <a href="https://law.yale.edu/system/files/area/center/schell/criminalization_of_homelessness_report_for_web_full_report.pdf">go somewhere else during the daytime</a>.</p><p><iframe class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" frameborder="0" height="400px" id="OrgkW" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/OrgkW/2/" style="border: none" width="100%"></iframe></p><h4>More laws</h4><p>As the number of people facing homelessness increases, local residents are demanding that their elected officials do something about <a href="http://www.nationalhomeless.org/publications/crimreport/meanestcities.html">the homeless people they encounter in their daily lives</a>. The leaders of cities, towns, and suburbs are often responsive.</p><p>But more often than not, municipalities don’t address the underlying problems that cause homelessness by, say, providing sufficient permanent housing, affordable housing, or shelters with <a href="https://www.springsrescuemission.org/low-barrier-shelter-what-does-mean/">minimal barriers to entry</a>. Instead, <a href="https://law.seattleu.edu/centers-and-institutes/korematsu-center/initiatives/homeless-rights-advocacy-project/additional-resources">criminalizing homelessness</a> is growing more popular.</p><p>Over the last decade, city-wide bans on camping in public have increased by 69 percent while city-wide panhandling bans rose by 43 percent, according <a href="https://www.nlchp.org/documents/Housing-Not-Handcuffs">to the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty</a>.</p><p><iframe class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" frameborder="0" height="400px" id="OfzuT" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/OfzuT/3/" style="border: none" width="100%"></iframe></p><p>Advocates such as the American Civil Liberties Union frequently <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/homeless/article208595844.html">challenge these laws in court</a>. Judges often strike down such laws on the grounds that they violate constitutionally protected rights, such as <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/as-panhandling-laws-are-overturned-cities-change-policies-1502204399">the freedom of speech</a> or <a href="https://www.nlchp.org/documents/Housing-Not-Handcuffs-Litigation-Manual">due process</a>.</p><p>Still, more and more communities keep trying to outlaw homelessness.</p><h4>Criminalizing homelessness is ineffective</h4><p>Not only do <a href="http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/students/groups/oslj/files/2015/10/Vol.-76-57-66-Mead-Essay.pdf">we and other legal experts</a> find these laws <a href="https://crosscut.com/2018/05/seattle-u-prof-city-cant-solve-homelessness-without-courage">to be unconstitutional</a>, we see ample evidence that they waste tax dollars.</p><p>Cities are aggressively deploying law enforcement to target people simply for the crime of existing while having nowhere to live. In 2016 alone, Los Angeles police arrested 14,000 people experiencing homelessness for everyday activities such as <a href="http://www.latimes.com/local/politics/la-me-homeless-arrests-20180204-story.html">sitting on sidewalks</a>.</p><p><a href="https://sf.curbed.com/2016/6/3/11852832/homeless-san-francisco">San Francisco is spending some $20 million</a> per year to enforce laws against loitering, panhandling, and other common conduct against people experiencing homelessness.</p><p>Jails and prisons make extremely <a href="https://thecrimereport.org/2018/06/18/jail-is-no-place-for-the-homeless-say-police-chiefs/#">expensive and ineffective homeless shelters</a>. <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2602530&amp;rec=1&amp;srcabs=2602533&amp;alg=1&amp;pos=2">Non-punitive alternatives</a>, such as permanent supportive housing and mental health or substance abuse treatment, cost less and work better, according to research one of us is doing at the <a href="https://law.seattleu.edu/centers-and-institutes/korematsu-center/initiatives/homeless-rights-advocacy-project">Homeless Rights Advocacy Project</a> at Seattle University Law School and <a href="http://www.csh.org/supportive-housing-facts/evidence/">many other sources</a>.</p><p>But the greatest cost of these laws is borne by already vulnerable people who are ticketed, arrested, and jailed because they are experiencing homelessness.</p><p>Fines and court fees quickly add up to hundreds or thousands of dollars. A Sacramento man, for example, found himself facing <a href="https://www.newsreview.com/sacramento/sacramentos-100-000-homeless-man/content?oid=23694183">$100,000 in fines for convictions for panhandling and sleeping outside</a>. These costs are impossible to pay, since the “crimes” were committed by dint of being unable to afford keeping a roof over his head in the first place.</p><p><img alt="The Conversation" height="1" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/97290/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" width="1">And since having a <a href="https://www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/opinion/the-city-is-not-keeping-my-stuff-after-an-arrest/">criminal record</a> makes getting jobs and <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1747-4469.2008.00092.x">housing much harder</a>, these laws are perpetuating homelessness.</p><p><em>This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="http://theconversation.com/why-turning-homelessness-into-a-crime-is-cruel-and-costly-97290">original article</a>.</em></p>Joseph W. Meadhttp://www.citylab.com/authors/joseph-w-mead/?utm_source=feedSara Rankinhttp://www.citylab.com/authors/sara-rankin/?utm_source=feedLucy Nicholson/ReutersPermanent supportive housing and mental health or substance abuse treatment cost less and work better.Criminalizing Homelessness Doesn’t Work2018-06-20T09:19:24-04:002018-06-20T16:58:58-04:00“Anti-vagrancy” laws are cruel, costly, and counterproductive. They make it even harder to escape homelessness.